


Memoirs of a Dying Vulcan

by DaLaRi



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Katra, M/M, T'hy'la, Vulcan Ideologies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-23
Updated: 2013-07-23
Packaged: 2017-12-21 02:38:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,699
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/894820
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DaLaRi/pseuds/DaLaRi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Spock Prime is dying, in the wrong universe, on a planet he was never supposed to know. On his deathbed, he reaches out to the only person he knows he can trust.<br/>Himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Memoirs of a Dying Vulcan

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, this is my first published fic, so I apologize for any glaring breaches of conduct that I may have stumbled upon, being the inexperienced newbie writer.  
> Anyway, disclaimer aside, I've been meaning to write this for a long time; I've been consumed with Spock Prime feels ever since I got around to watching the New Trek movies. I drew heavily from what I know about Vulcan ideologies, a few of which I interpreted a bit differently than most. I enjoyed writing it, and I hope you enjoy reading it!  
> If you'd like leave comments, I'd love to know what you think!

To: Commander S’chn T’gai Spock

My friend,  
  
I write this to you on the Vulcan colony on Erix Prime, as a clarifier of the twenty-eight years I spent knowing James T. Kirk, and as a last will and testament, if the need arises. I doubt it will, as any officer remotely trained in any variation of legal affairs will know to bequeath my belongings to myself.  
My story does not have a “happy ending.” I suppose, through this conclusion, it’s a tragedy from the human perspective, but I believe that it was a wonderful life that never was able to be lived the the fullest. If you can learn from my mistakes, I hope that yours can be the chance I never had.  
  
I was older than you were when I first stepped onto the deck of the Enterprise. I had grown up in a more peaceful Federation, one where Starfleet had remained dedicated to the ideologies of its founding. Nero's invasion changed more than you realize, but somehow, the katras of the crew managed to find their way back into the positions that they seemed to be destined for.  
James Tiberius Kirk was the captain of the USS Enterprise, youngest captain in Starfleet history, and my dearest friend. It took me years to allow myself to recognize the affection for which I felt for my captain, different from any I had experienced before. I realized now that the warmth I felt for him came from my very katra, that we had been t'hy'la even before we had realized that we were friends. My katra thrived in the presence of my captain, and I believe that his did too. I expressed emotion without realizing, without thought to stop myself. Around Jim, it was as though my shielding had never existed, and yet, when I turned to face the rest of the crew, I was as vulcan as my father and his father before him.  
  
Two years into our five-year assignment, I experienced pon farr twenty parsecs away from Vulcan, which was whole and thriving at the time. I had never read anything, not even a rumor or reference, of duality of pon farr, but I was drawn to Jim just as much, just as irresistibly as I was to T'Pring and my home. I did not understand why, but I knew that the repercussions would be devastating and irreparable if I allowed myself to succumb to Plak Tow. I was allowed to return to Vulcan, although I was forced to reveal the truth about my condition. Jim was remarkably understanding, if understandably awkward. He risked his commission in order to get me home in time.  
T'Pring chose to undertake kal-if-fee, and it was her logic that drove her to exploit my weakness, choosing my captain as her champion. I managed to regain control long enough to attempt to convince T'Pau to release him from the challenge, but she refused, and I sunk into the blood fever. I do not remember much from that time, but when I had appeared to have killed the captain, it seemed as though a part of my own katra had died. I would have undertaken fal-tor-pan if I could have, but I knew the captain was human. I released T'Pring from the bond, and closed my mind to her, as was customary. I then returned to the ship, ready to insist on disciplinary action. I was going to argue for the death sentence; I did not want to live knowing that I had killed the most honorable part of myself.  
However, Jim was alive. Doctor McCoy had given him a total paralytic in order to simulate death, and trick me out of the blood fever. A side effect had been a psionic block, which was why I had truly believed him to be dead. It seemed like my shields had never existed, and in that moment, I was as human as my mother had ever been. I recovered my composure soon enough, and as a matter of principle, insisted on the logic of my action. Doctor McCoy had begun to suspect, though what he suspected remains, to me, a mystery, but things between me and Jim remained much the same, although now I understood the depth with which my katra relied on that of James T. Kirk.  
  
We encountered Kahn aboard the Botany Bay years before he ever caused us grief, as he chose voluntary exile on Ceti Alpha V. Twenty years later, when Jim had traded in his captaincy for a position among the admiralty, Khan was rediscovered, the planet on which he had been stranded having become a barren wasteland during the time since we had left. Khan blamed Jim for this devastation, and during a routine inspection of the Enterprise, which I was in command of at the time, we were diverted to Regula I by request of Carol Marcus, previously a romantic partner of his. We arrived at Regula I to find most of the crew slaughtered. In an increasingly complicated series of events, Jim and I were separated, he on the planet, and I on the Enterprise. Khan revealed the extent of his plan, and Jim then beamed aboard, and we proceeded into the Mutara Nebula, which would disable the weapon tracking systems. We were forced to destroy the Reliant and Khan, but before his death, he managed to activate the Genesis device, which would create a planet in the space occupied by our two ships. The Enterprise was only capable of impulse power, due to the extensive damage from the fighting. I went down to engineering and, unable to meld with my captain, was forced to give my katra a host in Doctor McCoy. I repaired the warp drive, but was irradiated beyond recovery.  
Jim came to me in my last few minutes, and I grasped desperately at my shields, but they slipped from my grasp, and I was left with the fear and the sorrow and the pain. I reached for my captain, for warmth, for shelter in his mind and katra, but the glass separated us, and, in a moment of weakness, I offered my hand to him, and he returned the gesture. I do not think he ever understood the significance of what he had allowed me. I slipped away, and my katra, although reaching for Jim, was only able to find purchase in the mind of Dr. McCoy.  
  
I spent seven days trapped in the mind of a psi-null, with only a bond of friendship and my will to survive keeping me from dissolving completely. At times I broke the surface of the Doctor’s consciousness, but I was always pulled back under down to the darkness and the foreign swell of emotions that was the his mind.  
I awoke on Vulcan, in my body. Jim had sacrificed the Enterprise, his son, and, most likely, his career to get me home. I did not remember much, just snippets of memory and warmth, and the empty gaping space inside my mind where my memories should have been. All I had was a bond, and I remembered one name, and it threw into definition all the memories I had lost, as I witnessed the negatives, the same memories seen from another pair of eyes. I named him Jim, and only then could I remember who I had been. He was my captain before I was Spock.  
  
My captain died on the maiden voyage of the Enterprise-B, pulled through a hole in the bridge, and wiped from existence as though he was nothing but a puff of dust. I was two systems from him, on Vulcan, assisting with efforts to create red matter at the Vulcan Science Academy. I fell unconscious, and I had to be taken to the Katric Ark so that my katra would not follow his into the void. I remained locked in my mind until Saavik, the prodigal student of mine, melded with me, and coaxed me from where I had hidden, deep in my subconscious, telling me to honor my captain in death as he had me.  
His katra was gone. I spent a week in the place where he had disappeared, scouring the space with my mind, searching until my will no longer obeyed me. I couldn't even find an echo of him. It was as though he'd been stolen away. All I had left of him was the holopendant he had given me on my birthday. A present which has kept me sane and grieving for the past nine centuries. I find myself wondering how he would have reacted if all he had had was the book I had given him. It was _A Tale of Two Cities_ by Charles Dickens, a hardcover edition I had been given by my mother when I was young. In all the time I knew him, he never let it out of his sight. He called it a reminder of what he had almost lost, and as such, it was lost with him. I carry his pendant as he did, so I do not forget who he was.  
  
I have not written to you just to reminisce about my captain, but to ask something of you, a last request, if you will.  
I am dying. I have lived far too long in a world without my captain, and I am afraid that, in death, my katra will be trapped in this world, cut off from my Jim, left to flounder for all time. I have recently overseen the creation of a small test particle of the red matter, the same by which I arrived. I ask that you send me back to my universe, so I may rest with my captain. I know he would have been glad to know the two of you; I know for sure I am.  
My katra aches for his, as it has done for the past 94.378 years. I rest now knowing that our ship is safe, and that he continues to believe that the needs of the one outweigh the needs of the many.  
  
Live long and prosper.  
For both of our sakes.

Ambassador S’chn T’gai Spock


End file.
